“If only” and “despite all”

First-person narratives are meaning-making devices that can be used as powerful tools to direct developmental changes. For young people who have endured difficulties in their lives, the selection and configuration of such experiences may contribute in significant ways to how they come to understand themselves and what possibilities they hold. Repeated interviews with young people living in residential homes provided by Child Protection Services have demonstrated how the young people give accounts of their past and present as well as their future prospects. Some tell stories that speak of how things have turned out well despite everything that has troubled them. The hindrances to their development are turned around and adversity is spoken of as something from which they have benefitted. Others dwell on how things might have been better if only previous conditions had been otherwise. They get “stuck” because the things that could have made a difference belong to the past. The exploration of narrative configurations in the format of ”Despite all” and ”If only” may illuminate how personal accounts of events have significance in terms of subjectivation and further development. The configuration of self-narratives offers alternative understanding of how out- of-home placement sometimes fails as a measure to support development and how some young people manage despite adversity.